May 1, 2017

April 30, 2017 - Revelation 1:4-18

Revelation 1:4-18 John, To the seven churches in the
province of Asia: Grace and peace to you from him who is, and who was, and who
is to come, and from the seven spirits before his throne, and from Jesus
Christ, who is the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler
of the kings of the earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins
by his blood, and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and
Father—to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen. Look, he is coming
with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and
all the peoples of the earth will mourn because of him. So shall it be! Amen.
“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is, and who was, and
who is to come, the Almighty.” I, John, your brother and companion in the
suffering and kingdom and patient endurance that are ours in Jesus, was on the
island of Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. On the
Lord’s Day I was in the Spirit, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a
trumpet, which said: “Write on a scroll what you see and send it to the seven
churches: to Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia and
Laodicea.” I turned around to see the voice that was speaking to me. And when I
turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and among the lampstands was someone
“like a son of man,” dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a
golden sash around his chest. His head and hair were white like wool, as white
as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing
in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters. In his right
hand he held seven stars, and out of his mouth came a sharp double-edged sword.
His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance. When I saw him, I fell
at his feet as though dead. Then he placed his right hand on me and said: “Do
not be afraid. I am the First and the Last. I am the Living One; I was dead,
and behold I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and
Hades.

What do general Napoleon Bonaparte,
author Victor Hugo, actress Marlene Dietrich, and the Apostle John all have in
common? They all spent a portion of their lives in exile. Napoleon was forced
to the Mediterranean island of Elba in 1813. Victor Hugo fled to the British
channel islands when the French government did not like what he had written and
said. Marlene Dietrich left Germany to work in the United States and never
found it safe to return home after the Nazis came to power. The Apostle John?
He found himself on the island of Patmos “because of the word of God and the
testimony of Jesus.”

Patmos is a small Greek island in the
Aegean Sea, measuring only 13 square miles. John was driven there because of
his Christian teaching and preaching. There he “suffered” and “patiently
endured,” as he says.

You can imagine that John’s life in exile
would have been a sad and lonely existence. He could not go where he wanted to
go. He could not see people he wanted to see. He could not spread the good news
of Christ’s death and resurrection. His life would be in danger if he tried to
leave this island. He was suffering just like he said. He needed comfort—and He
was comforted in a very unique way.

He was comforted by a great vision—a
revelation—a revelation which he then wrote down and it is part of our Bibles
today, part of God’s own revealed word to us.

I.

At first, it doesn’t seem like John’s
vision would have been all that comforting to him. He “turned around…and saw
seven golden lampstands, and among the lampstands was someone ‘like a son of
man,’ dressed in a white robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash
around his chest. His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and
his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing in a
furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters. In his right hand
he held seven stars, and out of his mouth came a sharp, double-edged sword. His
face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance.”

Does that sound comforting? It doesn’t to
me either. It sounds scary. At first, John fell down when he saw it—like he was
dead. But it soon became clear that this was not a vision to be afraid of. This
was Jesus who had chosen to appear before him in just this way, not to scare
John, but to comfort him.

Jesus had risen from the dead, and now he
made Himself visible to John in a special manner. Dressed in a long robe, head
and hair white like wool, as white as snow. What does the color white remind us
of? In painting, white is an absence of color. It is the canvas that has not
yet been touched. It is the color of holiness, purity, and perfection. Jesus is
exactly that. He is holiness, purity, and perfection. It is significant that
Jesus was in white when He showed Himself to John at just this time, because
this was after He had come back to life from the dead.

On the cross, Jesus had not been
holiness, purity, and perfection. He had been anything but that. He had been
unholy, impure, and sinful, because on the cross He carried the sins of the
whole world. On the cross, He was made to be sin. He became the world’s worst
murderer, adulterer, thief, and blasphemer. On the cross, God the Father
pronounced judgment against Jesus by turning His back on Him by forsaking Him
and leaving Him alone. The Father would have nothing to do with the Son in
those hours of darkness on Good Friday, because the Son was suffering for every
evil of every age. On the cross, the wrath of God came down on Christ.

But now when John sees Jesus, he sees
white around that gracious head. What can that mean? Only that the living Son
of God has regained His holiness and purity. It means that Jesus is no longer
carrying the sin and evil He once carried—our sin and our evil.

The sight of Jesus alive in white speaks
comfort to every Christian soul. It says, “Your sin I once carried is gone. I
paid the price for it. I took it away. What once nailed me to the cross burdens
me no longer.” So John, comforted by what he saw, wrote of “him who loves us
and has freed us from our sins by his blood.” Jesus has done just that—He
has freed us from our sins. He has freed us from the suffering we deserved on
account of our sins. Jesus has made us “to be a kingdom and priests to serve
his God and Father.” Now we can go to the Father, free from sin and guilt.
Now we can serve God with thanksgiving and without fear. This was real comfort
for John in exile!

What so often happens when we in the
middle of suffering; when things are hard in our lives and we feel like we are
in exile ourselves? Don’t we so easily wonder: “What did I do to make God
angry? Is He saying ‘no’ to my prayers because of something I have done to
displease Him?” Aren’t we so quick to think that God must be against us?
Perhaps John thought some of these things in his moments of weakness too.

But we are comforted by the risen Christ
as John was. The risen Christ who shows us His purity, shows us that the sins
He once carried He carries no longer—they are gone.

II.

What Jesus’ powerful voice said to John
was an important comfort too. A voice like the sound of rushing waters. Jesus
said “I hold the keys of death and Hades.”

You’ve probably seen those western shows
or movies where the convicted criminal is in jail. He looks out through the
bars and sees the keys to the cell hanging on a hook across the room. The
sheriff holds the keys and the crook desperately tries to reach over and get
them. The one who holds the key to the cell is the one who is able to set the
prisoner free.

It’s easy to understand then what Jesus
means when He says, “I hold the keys of death and Hades.” We might also
translate the Greek word “Hades” as “the grave.” Jesus holds the keys of death
and the grave.

We are prisoners of death and Hades, aren’t
we? After all, who can avoid it? We try to keep it away with doctors and
medicines and hospitals, but no matter what we do death eventually comes. “Dust
you are and to dust you shall return,” God said to Adam way back in the
garden.

Enter the living Jesus Christ who changes
all this. To you who are prisoners of death Jesus says, “I have the key.”
He unlocks this prison cell and sets us free. Listen to the Apostle Paul’s
words to the Corinthians in chapter fifteen: “For as in Adam all die, so in
Christ all will be made alive. … So will it be with the resurrection of the
dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is
sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised
in power… Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all
be changed—in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the
trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable.”

Jesus holds the keys. He swings the door
open and frees us from the bondage of death. He does this by His own
resurrection from the dead. He is “the firstborn from the dead.” He broke out
of death’s prison, took the jailer’s keys in His hand, and He opens that prison
for you and for me.

How many times while exiled on Patmos did
John think his life was over, that he was trapped by death? We don’t know for
sure, but we know that it crosses our minds. Sometimes we feel death hanging
over us like a cloud. We see time slipping away from us and know that every day
brings us closer to it. We suffer and endure earthly troubles that cause us to
think about death.

But Jesus comforts you in the valley of
the shadow. He says to you, “I hold the key. I am one who unlocks this prison
called death. I am alive and I will come again to raise you and take you to be
with me.” Jesus will come again “with the clouds, and every eye will see
him,” John wrote. So shall it be. We will live again even as Jesus
lives—triumphant from the grave!

III.

The Lord stood before John in the vision
as the Savior who was alive forevermore. Several times in this Scripture text
from Revelation it is made clear that Christ was raised never to die again.
John calls Jesus “him who is, and who was, and who is to come.” And the
Lord says the same: “I am the first and the last. I am the Living One; I was
dead, and behold I am alive for ever and ever!”

There is no more death for Jesus. He will
not suffer on the cross again. His tomb is empty forever. Into eternity He is
alive, and those He raises from the dead will experience the same. You and I—we
will be alive forever and ever. We will not be eternal in the same way that
Jesus is eternal, existing through all time and space, but we will be like Him
in that once raised we will never die again.

He is alive forever and ever. We will
live forever and ever.

Think of that! No more death forever.
What comfort this sweet sentence gives!

Long ago on the tiny island of Patmos,
John was comforted by a vision of the risen Christ. Here too, we are privileged
to see the same vision in the pages of our Bibles, and to receive the same
comfort.

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Pastor Mark Tiefel

Pastor Mark S. Tiefel graduated from Immanuel Lutheran College and Seminary in Eau Claire, WI, in May of 2012. He previously served Bethel Evangelical Lutheran Church. He was installed at Redemption on April 12, 2015.